Matawhero Single Vineyard Gewürztraminer is a wonderfully expressive Gisborne white with all the exotic perfume you expect from the variety, but enough freshness and structure to keep it from becoming overly rich. Rose petal, jasmine and honeysuckle lead into lychee, Turkish delight and ripe stone fruit, with clove, star anise and ginger bringing a distinctive spicy edge. The palate is broad and gently luscious, yet the wine remains essentially dry, with just a small amount of residual sugar softening Gewürztraminer’s naturally generous texture. A few hours of skin contact before pressing helps draw out the grape’s floral and spicy aromatics, while cool stainless-steel fermentation preserves freshness and purity. There is no oak to disguise the fruit, leaving the contrast between perfume, spice and supple texture completely exposed. Even more importantly, this wine comes from a vineyard with a genuine place in New Zealand wine history: Matawhero was the first vineyard in the country to plant Gewürztraminer, and the variety played a major role in establishing the winery’s reputation internationally during the 1970s.
Matawhero Single Vineyard Gewürztraminer, Producer
Matawhero is one of the historic names of Gisborne wine. Its story began with Bill Irwin, an unlikely viticultural pioneer who began planting vineyards on the Poverty Bay flats at a time when much of the surrounding land was devoted to maize or livestock. He experimented with varieties and clones that were still unfamiliar in New Zealand, and plant material propagated at Matawhero subsequently helped shape the emerging national wine industry. His son Denis gained experience in wineries in South Africa and Germany before returning home and producing the first wines under the Matawhero label in the mid-1970s. Gewürztraminer quickly became one of the estate’s signatures: an early bottling achieved fourth place at an international wine show in Paris, while Matawhero wines were even sent to Buckingham Palace and acknowledged by Queen Elizabeth II.
Richard and Kirsten Searle purchased Matawhero from Denis Irwin in 2008, taking on a 15-hectare estate that required substantial restoration. They replanted much of the home vineyard, modernised production and rebuilt the range around distinctive, site-specific expressions of Gisborne. The connection with the past remains important, particularly with Gewürztraminer: rather than abandoning one of the grapes that originally made Matawhero famous, the Searles have continued to develop it as part of the Single Vineyard range. Their broader philosophy is centred on showing Gisborne’s naturally generous fruit and texture while retaining enough freshness and varietal identity for each wine to remain distinctive.
Matawhero Single Vineyard Gewürztraminer, Terroir & Winemaking
The fruit comes from Matawhero’s home vineyard in the Riverpoint appellation of Gisborne, historically significant as the first New Zealand vineyard planted to Gewürztraminer. The vines are planted with the ENTAV-INRA 47 clone on silt loam soils over clay, a combination that gives good moisture retention in Gisborne’s warm, relatively dry climate. The vineyard is vertically shoot positioned, with careful bunch thinning and leaf plucking used to create an open canopy and maintain a balanced crop. That helps the grapes reach full flavour ripeness while preserving the intense floral and spicy aromatics that define the variety. Matawhero’s wider vineyard philosophy also makes good use of Gisborne’s pattern of spring rainfall followed by long, dry summers, enabling significant dry farming across its vineyards.
Harvest timing is decided jointly by the winemaker and viticulturist once the fruit is considered flavour-ready. The grapes are brought into the winery while still cool, crushed and transferred to the press, where they remain for several hours before pressing. That short period of contact with the skins is particularly useful with Gewürztraminer because many of its characteristic aromas are concentrated in the skins; it helps amplify rose, spice and exotic-fruit character without turning the wine into a heavily extracted style. After light clarification, the juice undergoes a cool fermentation using an aroma-enhancing yeast. The wine is then gently fined, stabilised, filtered and bottled. There is no oak maturation, allowing the aromatic intensity and naturally broad texture of Gewürztraminer to remain the focus.
Matawhero Single Vineyard Gewürztraminer, Tasting Notes
Pale straw with subtle golden highlights. The nose is immediately recognisable as Gewürztraminer, with rose petal, jasmine and honeysuckle accompanied by lychee and ripe white stone fruit. Clove, star anise and ginger add a wonderfully aromatic spicy quality, while more subtle dried-herb notes emerge with air. The producer highlights rose petal, clove, lychee and star anise as defining aromas, with Turkish delight and ginger becoming particularly prominent on the palate.
The palate is rich and broad but remains fresh enough to avoid becoming heavy. Lychee and Turkish delight give an exotic sweetness of flavour rather than an overtly sweet finish, with the current technical information placing residual sugar at only around 6.5g/L. Ginger, clove and floral flavours continue through the middle of the palate, while gentle acidity gives the wine enough lift to balance its naturally silky texture. The finish is persistent and aromatic, leaving lychee, spice and flowers behind. This is a fuller, more opulent aromatic white than Sauvignon Blanc or Riesling, but it retains enough freshness to be extremely versatile with food.
Food pairing suggestion: Thai Red Prawn Curry with Coconut, Lime and Jasmine Rice.
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